Porsche's new CEO is betting on pricier cars and tougher employee terms to stage a revival

Porsche CEO Michael Leiters is pushing to raise prices on the automaker's most expensive models and to tie employee bonuses to financial results as he tries to reverse a slide in profit, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The Volkswagen-controlled sports carmaker presented its "Sportwagenschmiede '35" turnaround plan at a capital markets day on Oct. 7, according to CNBC. The plan's long-range goal is a 15% operating margin across the group, and the company said it wants to break even at annual volumes of 200,000 vehicles or fewer. Porsche sold 279,449 vehicles in 2025.

Porsche is targeting a rise in the typical sticker price of its 10,000 costliest cars sold annually, to roughly $370,000 in dollar terms from $300,000, according to The Wall Street Journal. The company is also developing a three-row SUV that would cost more than the Cayenne. Leiters would also like to expand sales of special-run variants of today's lineup, some of which command up to $15 million, according to the Journal.

On Thursday, Porsche revealed a midengine concept car called Mission S that it positioned above the 911 as a "super sports car platform," according to CNBC. The company gave no price or performance details for upcoming models of that sort.

"A Porsche must be recognisable as a Porsche at first glance," Leiters said in a release, according to CNBC.

The employee changes include a July agreement with union representatives that raised the planned job reductions to about 9,000 through 2035, equal to roughly 20% of the workforce, according to The Wall Street Journal. The agreement also trimmed remote-work allowances from 12 days a month to eight and made the yearly bonus depend on financial results. German staff received no customary annual bonus this year, after a payout that exceeded $10,000 in 2024, according to the Journal.

Leiters has said that going forward, part of any bonus payout will come as shares, according to the Journal.

Leiters took over at the start of 2026 from Oliver Blume, who remains CEO of Volkswagen. Porsche in April reported a 22% drop in first-quarter operating profit to €595 million from €762 million. Deliveries fell to 60,991 vehicles from 71,470, and U.S. tariffs cost the company €200 million in the quarter.

Porsche's operating margin was 1.1% in 2025, down sharply from 14.1% in 2024, a stretch in which expenses climbed, U.S. tariffs bit and Chinese demand weakened.